Keeping up with the keyboard

Things have been very busy at LadyNicci HQ this week. There was some recovery from the wonderful IPB Awards and lots of follow up too. I love to network and I’ve met so many interesting people that it took me a week to catch up with everyone and say a proper hello.

I’ve been helping with the hubby’s business (if you ever need a bit of music for your modem check them out www.perfectstrangerpro.com) so there’s been a bit of networking there too. I set up a new Facebook page for the blog on recommendation from fellow bloggers. You can like it and make me feel like a popular person if you like.

This year’s greatest online addition to parenting www.herfamily.ie will be featuring a small piece I wrote about 8 month olds in the coming week or so. And I got to write my C-section birth story for a new website launching soon.

Thrown into the mix was a foray back to the stage with Cool Chicken and the X-Men. This up and coming Drogheda based band are all about fun – and it was great getting back behind the microphone for a night. I’ll be depping with them until the end of the summer. I’ve added a pre-gig selfie; check out my hair roll from Claire’s Accessories.

Remind you of anyone? The Fonz perhaps?

With working, blogging and you know, being a Mum, the book has not so much taken, but been flung into the back seat. After the IPB Awards I decided that May was the month to get the head down and actually produce some fiction writing.

I’ve been doing what I feared would happen; reading and researching, but not doing any writing. Because I started off with a vague idea for a theme, I’ve been finding my research has helped me mould a storyline. I’m afraid if I stop researching, I’ll lose the ideas that have been flowing. I’m also terrified to actually commit pen to paper. At the moment the book is a project ahead of me, one without errors; I see only the finished perfect product. By putting the writing on the screen, I immediately destroy that perfect image, because then I’ll have text to scrutinise and criticise.

There has been some great progress however. Two field trips (one to London no less) have been completed. An interview with the author of the original story I’ll be using as a theme in the book has been set up. Eight (proper) books have been read. The full storyline has been completed and some in depth character sketches drawn out.

The greatest progress has been the downloading of a lovely little programme called Scrivener. I’d always wanted to buy novel software, but felt it was a bit like buying fancy stationery. Lovely tools but where’s the produce?

Scrivener is quite a clever programme in that you can lay your whole book out in front of you in small bite-size chunks, and it makes you want to fill in the chapters scene by scene. Before this I had bits of book in different folders on my laptop. One hour after I’d downloaded the programme I’d planned the first chapter of the book, including filler scenes. At the end of this programme I hit a few buttons and out comes a whole book apparently.

Last week I attended a book launch of I Am In Blood by a local author called Joe Murphy. His storyline is set in the red light district of Dublin 1890, a theme closely associated with my book. I hope to meet with him too to trade literary secrets and find out how hard you have to work to hold down a full-time job and publish three books.

I’m looking forward to the launch of Sharyn Hayden’s book I Forgot to Take My Pill later this month. Sharyn is hilarious and I know her book will do really well. You can visit her blog at www.raisingireland.com . We have a running joke that I’m her stalker (because I’m such a fan of hers) but I really do admire her writing, her comedic abilities and the fact that she will now have a real live book on the shelves. I’m hoping that some day in the not too distant future, she will turn up to my book launch. Let’s put a date in the diary, shall we?

Be the first to comment

Stay connected

About Me

My name is Nicola Cassidy. I live in Ireland, about an hour from Dublin. I'm a wife, a sister, a Mum and a stepmum, a dog owner, home owner, blogger, singer and I work in marketing. I love dancing, drinking and talking. And in my spare time, I write.